


So You'll Breathe

by matan4il



Series: Because Only the Heart [4]
Category: Emmerdale
Genre: Introspection, M/M, brief mention of the doc, very brief - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-03
Updated: 2018-01-03
Packaged: 2019-02-27 21:06:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 602
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13256628
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/matan4il/pseuds/matan4il
Summary: ‘Robert’.It's an unassuming Tuesday morning when Aaron wakes up with that whisper in his mind.Just a few thoughts from Aaron's perspective on what I think makes Robron so undeniable as a couple. As always with this series, can be read as a stand alone, too.





	So You'll Breathe

**Author's Note:**

> Title is a completion of the quote I used for [And I'll Breathe](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12980352). 
> 
> Within the [Because Only the Heart](https://archiveofourown.org/series/891441) series, this is the 4th fic according to the order I wrote them in, but chronologically, it fits between the 2nd and the 3rd ones (so this is post break-up and pre-reunion).
> 
> Unbeta'd, sadly. Any and all feedback very much appreciated, hope you'll enjoy!

‘Robert’.

It's an unassuming Tuesday morning when Aaron wakes up with that whisper in his mind. That name. ‘Robert’. Soft. Almost as soft as his husband is, despite how well he hides it from the rest of the world. His ex, Aaron corrects himself quickly. But it's too late. 'Robert', he can still hear it, though it's fading now and it strikes him as a rallying call. This is how they summoned knights in olden days. A call to the banner, raised up, held high to remind them of what they fight for. 

It should be, maybe even could be, a bloodless battle, fighting for love. For his love. Just a walk down the streets of the village until he finds the familiar frame and face. The beloved smile. Until he allows himself to get lost in those knowing eyes. He’ll smile in return and won’t have to say a word explicitly. Robert will understand.

Because that’s the thing about them, the knowing. That’s what makes them more themselves when they’re together than when they are apart. It’s what keeps them bonded even when they are separated. It’s how Robert is more Aaron than anyone else has ever been. More than any other person Aaron has known or any man he has ever dated, no matter how suitable and compatible they seemed to be, nor how much their interests seemed to align with his own. They’d never get as close as Robert did. Any biographical details Aaron might have shared with them, it was all skin deep. Robert lived beneath that, inside him. 

Aaron isn’t sure when exactly did he realize that even now, having been months without each other, he can still clearly recognize himself in Robert too. In the parts that no one else is aware of, parts that are entirely Aaron’s. The more frightening insight is when he’s washing his hands in the bathroom one day. The doctor he is currently dating comes up behind him and it happens lightning fast. The automatic wide grin that Aaron has become used to putting on, to keep from being discovered. The reflection of it that he catches, that confronts him in the mirror. Awareness. That Robert doesn’t just have parts in which Aaron can see himself reflected. He is carrying within him actual parts of Aaron that are now, given Robert’s absence, missing from the man they originated with. The most frightening part is how it’s not fear of this realization that fills Aaron. It’s longing and ache. In the mirror, he notes that his wide, fake smile just got wider.

‘Robert’. A call to arms. A call to return to love. To return to himself. There’s no battle Aaron would prefer fighting in more than this. No weapons. No brute force. Not even armours are needed. A call to stand before Robert, emotionally naked once more. To let himself be known. Aaron’s lips tingle with the ghost promise of kisses sealing the end of the only war in which neither side loses. 

‘Robert’, Aaron lets himself stretch in bed as the whisper lingers still, close to inexistent by now and yet refusing to disappear completely. 

Then he curls up again in the bed that was supposed to be theirs. Aaron would choose no other battles. Yet here he is, fighting a combat that chose him and now he has to do all he can to keep his head above water. He puts his armour back on, brick by brick. Seals behind this wall from prying eyes, from what can’t be anymore, the parts of himself that will always be Robert.


End file.
